Just Look Up

Starsky told him if he looked up at the night sky, everything would be okay. But would it be enough? Could it ever be?

Hutch tilted his head back and scanned the early evening sky. The lights of the city combined with the smog and the intermittent clouds to block the celestial body from view, but it finally showed its luminous round face as the clouds wafted elsewhere, revealing in their wake an almost-full silvery globe.

Squinting hard, Hutch could almost imagine he saw a face amongst the craters. But what did it matter, when it wasn’t Starsky’s face?

###

“Just look up,” Starsky had told him before boarding the plane that would take him far away from Hutch, “and know that I’ll be looking up at the same moon.”

“Starsk, since we’ll be in different time zones, you’ll see the moonrise before I do. You know that, right?” Hutch smiled, but he was only pretending to feel cheeky. And Starsky surely knew he was faking it, too, because it was how they had always dealt with stress and worry. But inside, Hutch’s stomach was churning. He had a feeling that Starsky was also aware of that, but was trying not to show it.

Despite his despair, Hutch forced himself to continue. “And then there are clouds to consider, and rainy nights, and-”

“Shut up, Blondie, you’re ruining the moment.” Starsky grasped Hutch’s face with both hands and leaned in close, pressing his lips softly against Hutch’s, preventing him from speaking further.

But Hutch pulled away. Mustn’t get too sentimental. Can’t, or I’ll fall apart. We both will. “What about the new moon? What then?”

“Huh?”

“The new moon. You know, once a month when the moon is between the Earth and the Sun, and we can’t see it because the side facing us isn’t illuminated. What am I supposed to do on those nights, dummy?” He was only partly joking, but it was either that or become reduced to a sobbing, incoherent mess.

“You,” Starsky purred, “need to stop talking right now. Maybe this will do it,” he added, shoving his tongue inelegantly down Hutch’s throat. For a while, the only sounds emanating from Hutch were contented moans as he briefly pushed his fears to the back of his mind and concentrated on the feeling of his lover’s mouth intermingling with his own.

I love you I love you I love you and goddammit I don’t want you to leave. But Hutch knew it was futile. Starsky had made his decision, not lightly, but with much thought and consideration. And he knew Starsky wasn’t any happier about it than he was. What was that stupid saying? ‘If you love someone, let them go’? It was bullshit! A bunch of nonsense. Hutch wanted to wring the throat of whatever idiot came up with it. Stupid motherfucker. I’ll bet that person never loved anyone in their entire life. They were probably just jealous of anyone who had. Asshole! Fuck!

“Hey, I’m tryin’ to kiss you here, but I gotta feeling that your mind is elsewhere.” Starsky snapped his fingers in front of Hutch’s face. “Earth to Hutch-”

“Sorry.” Hutch pulled away just long enough to look into Starsky’s eyes, but instead of resuming their make-out session, he pulled Starsky into a tight embrace, burying his face into Starsky’s thick, dark curls as he breathed deeply and inhaled the heady mixture of sweat, musk, and citrus-scented shampoo. Would he ever smell those curls again, or feel them caress his cheeks? God, I hope so. Please don’t let this be the last time. He realized he was shaking.

“Oh babe, my heart is breaking, too,” Starsky whispered into the silence.

###

They had booked two appointments with Ray and arrived precisely on time. She was one of the best tattoo artists in Bay City, and besides, they’d known her for years and trusted her. It was a rare person indeed who earned the trust of Bay City’s two finest detectives, and Ray was one of the lucky few who qualified.

After the decision had been made and Starsky’s departure was imminent, it had been Starsky’s idea for them to get matching tattoos. Each consisted of a small crescent-face moon, not more than an inch high, and its smaller companion star. He told Hutch it would remind each of them to look up at the sky at night and know that they were seeing the same moon and stars. Starsky had tears in his eyes as he said it.

When they told Ray they wanted the tattoos-one on Starsky’s left hip and the other on Hutch’s right-she didn’t question why. She didn’t have to. She nodded her head and carefully transferred the drawing they’d brought with them, which Hutch had drawn in pencil the day before as he sat at his kitchen table with Starsky looking on. He’d placed his necklace on the paper and diligently traced around it, then added in the facial features and shading by hand.

###

Hutch kept his eyes fixed on the glowing orb above, even after his neck developed a painful crick from tilting it back. When he couldn’t stand the pain anymore, he sat down on the curb outside Venice Place, leaned back against a sturdy tree and kept his gaze upwards. He thought about Starsky looking up at the same moon, surrounded by the same stars and planets.

“Just look up,” Starsky had told him, “and know that we’ll be under the same sky. Then it won’t feel like we’re so far apart.” But Starsky was wrong, Hutch thought, for the longer he looked up at the dark sky, the glowing moon, and the twinkling stars that were millions of light years away, the more he was overcome by the vastness of the universe and their place within it, and he realized just how small and insignificant he and Starsky truly were.

Soon, it became difficult to focus on the brightly lit object as the tears welling up in Hutch’s eyes threatened to obscure it completely. But still, he continued to look up.

-The End-